Fresh iPhone Apps for March 2012

The weekend’s just about here, which is the perfect time to check out timeRAZOR, an app that’s designed to help you get the most out of your time. Input your schedule and appointments, and timeRAZOR searches the areas around where you’ll be when you’ll be there to find events you might want to attend. We’ve followed that up with an app to help get you prepared (kind of) for the 2012 U.S. Presidential Election: Comedy Central’s Indecision Election Companion. You can probably guess what it’s like. A great take on the vertical scrolling genre, Cordy Sky, leads the weekend’s game offerings, mixing platforming elements with nice visuals and addictive jumping gameplay. And finally, there’s the freemium Universal Movie Tycoon, a city-building management game that puts you in charge of a movie studio.

timeRAZOR (iPhone, iPad) Free

Part to-do list app and part local events tracker, timeRAZOR is designed to help users optimize their time by using the events you already have planned to help you find new ones of which you can become a part. Inputting your plans for the day, such as a planned dinner with a friend at a certain restaurant at a certain time, allows timeRAZOR to search the area around the restaurant and near that same time, and then suggest other events you might want to attend.

TimeRAZOR allows you to track your appointments and their locations within the app to help stay on task with the things you’ve got planned, but in addition to finding out what’s going on around you at any given time, it’ll also deliver traffic reports for your area, so you can plan even better. The app also keeps track of things near where you live and work, so it can find events you might want to attend that aren’t necessarily tied to another event or appointment.

Comedy Central’s Indecision Election Companion (iPhone, iPad) Free

With the 2012 U.S. Presidential Election drawing ever closer and Republican candidates still duking it out against one another, there’s a lot of political comedy to be had. That’s where Comedy Central’s Indecision Election Companion comes in. Taking a page from the Indecision election coverage spearheaded by The Daily Show, the app is packed with blog posts, news items and hilarious photos, all with a political slant.

The Indecision Election Companion doesn’t contain any video, as the description explains, but it does include lots of things to read and check out. It includes real-time reactions from the politics-infused comedy team behind the app, as well as lots of blog posts each day dealing with the latest events in the election. There’s also a 2012 election calendar, and an ever-growing election photo gallery.

Cordy Sky (iPhone, iPad) Free

Fans of delightfully cute but engaging 3-D platformer Cordy will appreciate Cordy Sky, developer Silvertree Media’s take on the vertical scrolling jumping genre. The game bares its similarities to mainstays such as Doodle Jump and Megajump, but defines itself with some mostly tight gameplay and great graphics. Plus, Silvertree has mixed some of its platforming controls and level design in with the jumping genre, creating a hybrid that’s more engaging than your typical entry in the genre.

In each of the five stages, you control the robotic Cordy as he tries to climb as high as possible by bouncing off springs and other objects. Directional buttons or tilt controls allow you to direct Cordy left and right around the screen, and he also has the capability to jump (and even double-jump) in order to take more control of his ascent. You’ll also collect gears along the way, which can be used to purchase power-ups and other collectible stuff from the Cordy Sky’s in-game store.

Universal Movie Tycoon (iPhone, iPad) Free

Another in the growing genre of free-to-play management titles, Universal Movie Tycoon is tied to the iconic film studio, allowing you to construct your own from the ground up, and then to buy real movie scripts, sign directors and stars, and get them made on your backlot sets. When your movies are finished, you’ll earn money from the box office, allowing you to buy more sets and increase the value of your studio.

You can make as many as 35 different films through the course of the game, as well as purchase multiple buildings that make your set pull down more money, ranging from warehouses to flowers. It’s also the kind of freemium title in which you’ll put up your buildings and characters on tasks and then be able to leave while they complete them, which makes it addicting without being time consuming.

Dark Meadow update (iPhone, iPad) $5.99

Last year, Dark Meadow hit the App Store and brought a horror vibe and a first-person perspective to the same basic set of mechanics seen in Infinity Blade. The game excels in terms of atmosphere and slow-burn storytelling, placing players in an abandoned mental hospital that’s overrun by monsters that have to be dispatched by dodging their attacks and then slicing them apart with a sword. It’s been a while, but Dark Meadow just got a very big update.

The game has been expanded by about a third and now has new weapons, maps to help with navigation and other handy improvement. It has also been optimized for Apple’s new Retina display-capable iPad, so the Unreal Engine graphics really shine. There’s also a freemium version of the game called Dark Meadow: The Pact, so if you haven’t given Dark Meadow a shot before now, it’s worth checking out, if only for its atmosphere.

Gnu Revenge (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

There have been physics games with space themes, planetoids and gravity wells in the App Store for quite a while now, and even though Rovio Mobile has grabbed all those things to use in Angry Birds Space, more gravity-ridden space puzzlers are still on their way. One such is Gnu Revenge, a puzzler in which you have only one button to push, and require a light, deft touch.

In Gnu Revenge, your job is to fire a jetpack just enough to allow your gnu to navigate each level, using the gravity of different objects to allow him to save other gnus and then smash head-first into the flying saucer of an evil crocodile. If it sounds weird, it is – which makes it pretty endearing – and it’s definitely tough, as well. Fire the jetpack too much and you’ll slingshot off into the void; too little and you’ll create a new crater on the nearest celestial body. With 72 levels, you’ll be busy rescuing gnus for a while.

Ion Racer (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Tilt-based 3-D racing title Ion Racer packs all the high-speed sci-fi action you’d expect. At the outset, you build your racer by adding custom components you can purchase with items you find on the track. Once you’re ready, it’s time to blast through the tracks. The goal is to pick up floating energy orbs along the way to use to purchase more parts, while smashing through blue barriers to earn points and avoiding red ones, which can damage you.

Ion Racer uses tilt controls and gives you the ability to either accelerate in short bursts, in order to take out red barriers, or to hit the brakes, allowing for tighter steering. The longer you survive in any given run, the higher your points multiplier becomes and the more energy you take down for use in upgrading your craft. There’s also Game Center support for achievements and leaderboards.

Rinth Island (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Rinth Island is a 3-D puzzle game that’s primarily about pushing blocks to reach a specific point in each of the game’s levels. As one of two characters, you’ll start at one point in a rounded level and have to figure out what blocks to push and where, which walls to detonate and what various other things you’ll have to manipulate along the way so you can get to the goal. Mess up, and you’ll either have to use an undo on your mistake – which you can purchase – or restart the puzzle altogether.

Each level in Rinth Island is actually four puzzle-driven challenges. There’s the adventure mode, in which the goal is just to reach the end of the stage and drive the story, plus modes that have you chasing down crystals hidden in each stage, counting your steps to the end and trying to hit a certain time. You can also create your own levels for others to play and download levels made by other players.

Q-Up (iPhone, iPad) Free

Networking app Q-Up is basically designed to allow users to quickly and easily trade contact information without having to do a lot of talking to get it done. The app makes use of your iOS device’s Bluetooth capabilities, allowing you to quickly share your pre-approved contact information with a nearby device – owned by someone you just met – in order to hand off your name, email address, phone number and whatever else you might want to provide.

Q-Up has a number of handy features that make it easy to keep track of who you met, where and when. You can add dates and times to contact information to help jog your memory of your meeting, and add data about yourself that you can quickly toggle on or off to customize what you want to share with each new person you meet. Once you’re all set, it’s just a matter of connecting with another users with a single button.

Pix: Pixel Mixer (iPhone, iPad) Free

There’s a ton of photo editing and filtering apps in the iTunes App Store, but often with such apps, simple is better. Pix: Pixel Mixer does a pretty good job of keeping things simple for its users, while providing lots of filters that users can add to their photos. Even better, you can add multiple filters to your shots, mixing and matching their effects to get the result you’re looking to achieve.

Pix includes 30 filters, as well as 24 film layers you can add over top of your shots, and another 16 frames to use to finish off your shots when you’re done adjusting them. Filters are added with a single touch, and you can save your favorite effects for later so you remember what they are. There’s also an option to add random effects, and you can save your results with others through Facebook, Twitter and email.

Super Lemonade Factory (iPhone, iPad) $1.99

Side-scrolling platformer Super Lemonade Factory’s retro feel and art-style perfectly complements its somewhat simple but engaging gameplay. You take on the role of a couple that has just inherited the responsibility of running a lemonade factory, and have to deal with untrusting employees as you work through each level of the game. There are two characters, each with different capabilities, and in order to solve each level, you’ll frequently have to switch between them.

Super Lemonade Stand includes 72 platforming levels and some pretty mature storytelling, revealed as you speak with employees and learn more about the world and the business you’re running during wartime. It also packs a level editor so you can make stages of your own, and Game Center support for achievements and leaderboards.

Burning Run (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Burning Run is a pretty simple casual title, and it’s all based on having the right tool for the job. In each level of the game, you’ll be tasked with saving various critters from a forest fire. Your job is to put out fires on the heads of those animals using various tools. You’ll start with a bucket, which is good for swiping the flames off rabbits, but before long you’ll need tougher tools to save bigger animals.

As you progress through Burning Run, you’ll earn coins that can be spent on upgrading your tools or buying new ones. You’re able to return to past levels to earn more money to buy upgrades and ammo for your different tools, which is key to success. Burning Run includes 84 levels of frantic and fiery action, as well as three difficulty modes through which to test your skill.

Madonna update (iPhone, iPad) Free

In celebration of her latest album, MDNA, Madonna has released an iPad version of her iOS app, which allows users to stay tapped in to the latest news of what’s going on with the singer. The app also packs a new theme inspired by the album, as well as a Madonna news feed that brings up-to-the-minute information about the pop star.

In addition to the new iPad version, the Madonna app packs a lot of the usual fare seen in apps for musicians. It includes photos from live appearances and concerts, music tracks from MDNA and Madonna’s other works, videos from concerts and a “wall” where listeners can leave their comments and share Madonna media.

Oyster.com Hotel Reviews and Photos update (iPad) Free

Check out the details – and reviews – of more than 2,500 hotels with Oyster.com’s iPad app. With the release of Apple’s new iPad, the app has been updated to take advantage of Retina capabilities and packed with big, glossy photos from hotels found in more than 100 places. All the hotels are reviewed by Oyster.com’s experts, not by regular users.

Oyster.com allows users to search by hotel and check through more than 700,000 photos from the various hotels reviewed within the app. It also includes lots of different indicators to let you know what each hotel will allow and won’t, and which amenities each one offers. It’s a great way to figure out where you should be staying next time you travel.

Bitter Sam (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Tilt-based casual game Bitter Sam starts with somebody lowering a tiny creature called Sam down a drain. In each level of the game, your goal is to direct Sam around hazards that can kill him by tilting your iOS device, as if you really were lowering him down a drain. Along the way, you’ll need to grab diamonds and other objects to increase your score in each stage.

Bitter Sam includes 100 levels to play through spread across five different worlds. You’ll find power-ups along the way that make Sam move faster or protect him from obstacles, and earn points as you go by keeping clear of walls and other obstructions to earn points. Bitter Sam also packs Game Center support for achievements and leaderboards.

Sliced Bread (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Swipe-based Sliced Bread is a lot like titles such as Fruit Ninja. The game is all about slashing through food. Various baked goods go flying through the air, and players need to slash through them as fast as possible, cutting them into small pieces and hitting multiple items to create combos. The more you slash and the faster you cut the bread apart, the more points you score.

Sliced Bread includes two different game modes, one in which you’ll need to slash through lots of food as fast as you can before the timer runs out, and one in which you’ll need to get as many points scored as you can while avoiding angry fruit that trigger a game over if you hit them. Your scores are tracked on leaderboards provided by Game Center and OpenFeint.

Flixel (iPhone, iPad) Free

Photography app Flixel is in the business of creating animated .GIF files. Those are the images you see around the Internet that loop a few frames of still images together to make a very short animation. Flixel allows users to capture several frames of action using their iOS devices, then animate just certain parts of the still image – like birthday candles on a cake, for example.

What makes Flixel cool is how easy the animation process is. You just swipe a finger over the area of the frame you want animated, and Flixel adds the rest of the stills to that area. Once you’re done, you can share your image with one tap on Facebook, Tumblr or Twitter, or by email. You can also view well-liked Flixel images from other users, as well.

PlayUp update (iPhone, iPad) Free

Just in time for March Madness comes an update to social sports viewing app PlayUp. Already, fans could use PlayUp to keep track of scores across lots of different sports, ranging from Major League Baseball to the National Hockey League and everything in between. You can also engage in discussions with friends across the app about more 23,000 different games.

The updated PlayUp app includes a newly redesigned interface. It also includes tabs that can be used to quickly flip between different games and keep up with the action, and lets users add friends from different social networks quickly and easily. You can also message across multiple social networks at once from within PlayUp.

Harry the Fairy (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

There are stars to collect and fairies to free in Harry the Fairy, a tilt-based game in which you need to guide the titular Harry through various levels, carefully avoiding traps, obstacles and hazards. The game is deceptively simple – your only real goal is to reach the end of each series of tunnels – but the only way to pull down the best possible score in each level is to seek out stars and power-ups.

Those power-ups consist mostly of bubbles that protect you from harm, guaranteeing a second chance should you mess up and veer into a wall. Harry the Fairy excels with solid tilt controls and is easy to learn. It contains 28 levels and also packs Game Center support with achievements and leaderboards, which track how well you do in each level as well as how fast you complete them.

Node.Hack (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Another casual game to start the week is Node.Hack, a game in which you take on the role of a hacker attempting to liberate some data from various networks and collect some cash along the way. The controls are extremely easy. On each grid-based level, you just tap the node you want to access, looking for ones that contain data you can download to earn various sums of money. Your goal is to steal a certain amount in each network.

Things get more complex as AI security programs join the game, searching the network for your offending programming. If an AI drone runs into your glowing circular indicator, you lose, so you’ll have to avoid run-ins as you quickly download as much as you can and get out of the network. Weapon power-ups can be used if you cross their nodes, but timing and careful planning, as well as fast reflexes, are everything.

Blurtt (iPhone, iPad) Free

Messaging app Blurtt has a pretty simple mandate and mission: it’s often easier to depict what you’re trying to say with pictures rather than text – so why not use pictures? The app allows you to add images to messages you send using the app’s giant image database. All you have to do is put in the search terms of what you’re looking for, find a suitable image and tap it, and it’s ready to go in your text message or email.

Blurtt lets you track down images from either the Internet through the app’s service, or from your own Camera Roll, to use in your messages and emails. You can also adjust the font and size of text in your message, share your “blurtts” through Twitter and Facebook, and participate in the Blurtt community, where you can see and comment on other people’s Blurtts, as well as share your own.

National Geographic Adventure’s new app is basically a wealth of video showing some of the world’s greatest modern exploring. You can watch a number of explorers as they embark on a number of different journeys, including Robert Ballard’s discovery of the wreckage of the Titanic, as well as many others from around the world.

Greatest Stories Ever Told is filled with photos, text and videos about great adventures that span the globe. There’s mountain-climbing, caving, trans-Atlantic exploration and more, all with a scientific bent and all filled with information, as well as lush videos about the locations and the discoveries made within them. If you already enjoy National Geographic’s documentaries on TV, you’ll love them available right on your iPad.

Hunger Games: Girl on Fire (iPhone, iPad) Free

Just in time for the release of The Hunger Games in theaters comes Hunger Games: Girl on Fire. A side-scrolling running game with graphics of the 16-bit persuasion, Hunger Games puts you in the role of protagonist Katniss as she find herself in a series of fairly rough situations. You’ll need to swipe up and down to move her from one path to another to dodge attacks and tap to fire her bow to ward off attackers.

Hunger Games includes some pretty fast-paced action, as well as boss fights that require quick reflexes on the part of the player to stay alive, plus retro production values that give the game an interesting feel. It also packs Game Center support for achievements and leaderboards.

Madcoaster (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Another running title, Madcoaster is a little different from Hunger Games because it puts players in a runaway rollercoaster, but the principles are the same. Players tap to jump their coaster over gaps and onto different tracks, where they can pop over loops, snag coins and acquire power-ups to stay alive. There are also tons of enemies to plow through to earn points.

Madcoaster scores players by gauging how many coins they collect along the way and how much ground they can cover before crashing. It also includes leaderboards and achievements from Game Center, so players can check their skills against other players from all over the world.

Angry Birds Space (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

The latest entry into the incredibly popular arcade series is finally upon us: Angry Birds Space. With a new setting, new physics rules and even some new birds, Angry Birds Space adds quite a few elements to the tried-and-true formula that fans of the series have been enjoying for years. There’s enough new here to give players a great set of 60 new levels to explore, while keeping things familiar, as well.

Levels in Angry Birds Space provide lots of new challenges. Sometimes you’ll be flinging birds into low-gravity situations; other times, there will be no gravity at all. That means adjusting your strategy in new and different ways that players haven’t experienced yet. As usual, Angry Birds Space includes a bunch of hidden levels, plus Game Center support for achievements and leaderboards.

Hunters 2 (iPhone, iPad) $4.99

Turn-based sci-fi strategy game Hunters 2 puts players on foreign planets, commanding teams of marines as they explore grid-like levels and fight off monsters, enemy soldiers and other science-fictiony enemies. In each level, players take control of a team of fighters that can be moved around the game, taking turns fighting off bad guys and completing objectives.

As you complete levels and strengthen your characters, you’ll be able to find and purchase new weapons and armor, as well as specialize your team with abilities to give them different jobs. Hunters 2 also packs daily quests for players to complete and also includes a crafting system to give players another level of customization.

Swordigo (iPhone, iPad) $1.99

Side-scrolling adventure title Swordigo will likely remind plenty of gamers familiar with old-school Nintendo Entertainment System games of Zelda II: The Adventures of Link. The only side-scrolling game in the Legend of Zelda franchise, Link gives players a sword and sends them out into the world to kill stuff, find items and unweave a mysterious fantasy tale. Swordigo is basically like that, but with touch controls and great 2.5-D graphics.

Swordigo has players taking on quests as they travel around the world, earning new magical powers and destroying bad guys along the way. It includes both adventure game aspects and role-playing game characteristics, and packs some pretty great production values – particularly in the music department. It also features Game Center and iCloud support.

rComplex (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Indie running title rComplex started its life as an experimental PC title, and now that it’s hit iOS, the game has been reworked slightly from its original version. It’s still about running away from a huge black tentacle monster that’s always gaining on the player, and requires quick reflexes to jump over or slide under obstacles. As the monster grows closer, you can shoot it with your shotgun to keep it at bay, but you have a limited number of rounds at your disposal.

The new version of rComplex is divided into seven levels and tells more of a story than the PC version. It also features original music that keeps the adrenaline level high, and also packs more than a full hour of voice-over narration to tell the game’s story.

Smash Your Food HD (iPad) $2.99

Smash Your Food HD puts an interesting spin on nutrition education. The app is meant to teach kids about the foods they eat, but instead of just showing figures and information, it allows kids to smash foods in the app’s interactive videos. By manipulating the machinery on-screen with touch controls, users can mash sodas, burgers, doughnuts and all kinds of other foods, in order to discover what’s inside.

Users start by picking a food and guessing how much sugar, salt and oil is to be found within it. The smashing reveals what’s actually in the food, allowing kids to see what’s good and what’s not so good for them to eat. Smash Your Food also includes personalized nutrition tips for kids and parents alike. All the smashed food uses real HD video – it all really did get smashed – and detailed sound effects so you can get the full sloppy experience as you smash things up.

Byword (iPhone, iPad) $2.99

Writing on-the-go can be tough with mobile devices for a lot of reasons, not the least of which is the quality of the apps that allow users to take notes or create documents. Byword’s boon is that it strips out the bells and whistles, keeping the work space uncluttered to make it easy for writers to put words down even when using an iPad or an iPhone.

Byword automatically syncs your documents with iCloud and Dropbox to make sure you never lose what you’re working on, and allows you to export documents as HTML for blog posts or even print directly from the app. Byword can also be used for writing emails, and allows you to do lots of the same things you can do in other word processing programs, such as creating bulleted or numbered lists and editing them quickly and easily.

Dots Ball (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Vertical-scrolling jumping game Dots Ball uses a lot of the same rules and conventions as similar games in the iTunes App Store that lots of players have probably played by now. Tilt controls allow you to guide your character, a bouncing ball, around the screen with the aim to hit small dots to continue bouncing even higher. But a wealth of power-ups and different effects available to players makes Dots Ball a little more interesting than your run-of-the-mill jumping game.

The various dots you can land on in Dots Ball all have different properties, and your jumping is limited by a slowly depleting energy bar at the top of the screen that needs to be refilled periodically. You can’t just jump forever to see how high you’ll get, you actually have to pay close attention to where energy becomes available so you can grab it, and to know when to conserve energy and when to spend it to make bigger leaps.

TrafficWonder HD (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Puzzler TrafficWonder HD provides you with roads and cars of various different colors, each with a matching destination. Your goal in each level of the game is to draw a line from each car to its destination, attempting to get them there using the amount of fuel you have allotted in each stage. The trouble is, the cars all run at the same time, and you’ll need to plan your routes in order to keep them from colliding.

TrafficWonder throws lots of different elements your way. Some cars are faster than others, for example, and you’ll need to divert traffic in order to avoid collisions. But you also want to save as much fuel as possible to keep your score high, and that means TrafficWonder is going to demand some brain power and probably a lot of trial and error.

CS Product Reviews (iPhone, iPad) Free

Get all kinds of useful information about the products you’re thinking about purchasing before you buy them with CS Product Reviews. The app is filled with information about various products from actual consumers who have purchased them, allowing you to do on-the-fly research before committing your cash to something that might be a dud as soon as you get it home.

CS Product Reviews includes a bar code scanner to allow users to find products without having to type anything into the app, but it also includes text search capabilities as well. Users can also search for other stores to find different prices for the same products, using an iPhone or iPad’s GPS capabilities and with the results plotted on a map.

AllClear ID (iPhone, iPad) Free

Fraud and ID theft detection service AllClear ID’s new iOS app allows users to tap into the subscription service, allowing them to receive notifications and reports on their service and to more quickly protect themselves and recover from identity theft and fraud. The app basically lets you tap into the full capabilities of AllClear ID, wherever you are.

AllClear ID packs fraud detection tools for things ranging from your banking info to login credentials, as well as things like free ID protection programs that you can activate and manage as you see fit. And if something happens, you can use the app to connect with an AllClear investigator to help you sort things out before identity theft turns into a life-altering problem.

Rune Raiders (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Turn-based strategy game Rune Raiders looks a little strange at first. Players hire characters to play through each level in the game, which is set up as a grid. When you have your troops, you’ll move vertically through each level, fighting off monsters as they appear. Each character has certain capabilities, like being able to shoot arrows at distant squares on the grid or attacking only enemies that come within one square of them.

The formation you place your characters in is key to your success as you move through each fight, and how well you keep your characters alive and how efficiently you move through each stage affects your score for each level. You’ll also earn more money to upgrade your characters and hire new ones. You can track how well you do on each stage on Rune Raiders’ Game Center leaderboards.

Battleloot Adventures (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Another fantasy, turn-based strategy game, Battleloot Adventure is also about fighting monsters and using characters of different classes and abilities to be successful. In Battleloot, you basically go up against hordes of enemies, choosing which ones to attack with which of your characters, and tapping at the right time to defend yourself from counter-attacks. Choosing the right character for the job in each stage is key to winning battles.

Battleloot has more than 60 stages, and players will have to choose a city to fight for and a squad of characters to take into battle. Your formation, classes and special abilities will be key to victory, as will executing combos with different characters. Battleloot also packs Game Center, which supplies achievements to earn along the way.

TastemakerX (iPhone, iPad) Free

Social media music app TastemakerX is a strange experience. It’s something of a game, designed around “buying stock” in music you enjoy. The idea is that you can “buy” and “sell” shares in different bands, allowing people to see what you most enjoy and what you to see what they most enjoy. Then you can trade stocks in order to learn about new bands and spread your musical influence to others.

The game portion of TastemakerX is only part of the experience, however. You can also sample different songs and bands you find within the app to learn more about bands you might enjoy, and read news about various bands to stay up to date with what’s going on with them. Users can also share photos of their experiences with bands as well, and even geo-tag the entries.

Met Opera On Demand (iPad) Free

Opera fans can now get their fill streaming right to their iPads from the Metropolitan Opera’s subscription service with Met Opera On Demand. The app allows users to watch streaming video from the Met Opera’s “Live in HD” series, which are performances from opera stars transmitted to movie theaters. It also includes Met Opera telecasts of classic performances, stretching from 2001 all the way back to 1977.

Met Opera also packs tons of radio performances of operatic works by singers going back more than 70 years. Videos included in the app include English subtitles and many support lots of other languages, as well, helping users to get the most out of every performance.

Tobe & Friends Hookshot Escape (iPhone, iPad) $1.99

Climbing title Hookshot Escape provides you with an iconic item from the Legend of Zelda universe – the hookshot. It’s a vertical jumping game in which players need to climb as high as they can, using the grappling Hookshot to grab onto ledges and spring themselves up higher and higher. Along the way, you’ll fight off enemies, grab treasures and try to put combos together of several hookshot ascents in a row, in order to earn more money.

Hookshot Escape allows you to use the money you earn through your playthroughs to unlock different characters, which will alter the way you play with their various abilities. There are also power-ups you can find and different pieces of equipment that can change up the experience as well. And Game Center support allows you to track how well you do on Hookshot Escape’s online leaderboards.

Kale In Dinoland (iPhone, iPad) $1.99

Modeled after old handheld side-scrolling platformers of the Game Boy era, Kale in Dinoland puts players in the role of Kale as he adventures through a land infested by dinosaurs in search of his missing girlfriend. You’ll carry weapons to throw at enemies, like magic stars and what appear to be coconuts, but most of the bad guys you encounter can be ridden in order to reach new areas, as well.

Kale in Dinoland includes six different areas to play through, which comprise a total of more than 50 levels. There are eight varieties of enemies that can be ridden, and all have different capabilities and attributes once you’re aboard. Kale in Dinoland also includes Game Center support for achievements and leaderboards, plus a Game Boy-like retro art and music style.

The Daily’s Angry Birds Space Guide (iPhone, iPad) Free

It’s less than a week until the release of the next iteration of Rovio Mobile’s incredibly popular game series with Angry Birds Space. Until it hits, however, you can get geared up for the game with The Daily’s Angry Birds Space Guide, a full rundown of just about everything there is to know about the upcoming title and how it’s going to change the Angry Birds series for players.

The Angry Birds Space Guide includes interviews with the game’s developers straight from their offices in Helsinki, and as well as behind-the-scenes interviews and information. There also are NASA photos, as well as a lot of information about space and, of course, the game as well.

Givit – Private Video Sharing (iPhone, iPad) Free

There are plenty of ways to share videos online, but Givit sets itself apart by being a way to share videos in private through the app’s secure service. You can upload your videos to Givit and then send them to your friends, family and others, and they’ll be able to access them on just about any device they have, even if they don’t have the Givit app.

Givit makes it easy to record and send videos, and is useful for videos that are too big for other services such as email. You’re able to set exactly who is able to see your video, and who isn’t, as well as save your videos all in one place and back them up through Givit. People you let see your videos can also respond with comments.

Flight Control Rocket (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Firemint’s sequel to the extremely popular Flight Control does what Angry Birds is about to: it heads to space. With a great 1950s look and feel, Flight Control Rocket takes the classic gameplay of Flight Control (directing ships to their appropriate runways by drawing their flight paths with your finger) and reworks it by throwing tons of different kinds of ships your way and letting you tangle with all of them.

You’ll have to deal with 15 different kinds of ships in Flight Control Rocket, each with different attributes. Some will spawn other ships, others will pick up speed or slow down, and some come on huge carriers that have to be emptied quickly before they depart. You’ll also collect coins that can be spent to keep you in the game after too many crashes, and you can follow your progress on Flight Control Rocket’s Game Center leaderboards.

Sky Gamblers: Air Supremacy (iPhone, iPad) $4.99

Namco demonstrated Sky Gamblers: Air Supremacy during the announcement of Apple’s new iPad, and now the game is available in the App Store just in time for the new device’s launch. It features some stellar graphics to help immerse you in the fighter jet world into which you’re embarking filled with dog fights and high-speed missions.

Sky Gamblers uses a mix of touch and tilt controls to allow you to guide your plane through the air from your seat in the cockpit. You’ll have to use machine guns and missiles to take down opponents, as well as barrel rolls, loops and flares to avoid getting taken down yourself. The game has a full single-player campaign, as well as several online modes for both competitive and cooperative play.

Chaos Rings II (iPhone, iPad) $17.99

The latest in Square Enix’s popular role-playing game series, Chaos Rings II packs another long, involved story in the Final Fantasy style that lots of players all over the world have loved for years. It features a story “molded by player decisions,” in which you play the hero, Darwin, who’s required to kill five sacrifices in order to save the world. Trouble is, one of the sacrifices is a childhood friend of his.

Chaos Rings II features a new battles system, as well as the old staples that Chaos Rings fans have come to expect, like lots of huge boss battles. The game also features multiple endings, and Square Enix has something like two months of content updates already planned for the game. If you’re a fan of the series, the high price tag is probably worth it.

MotoHeroz (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Physics-heavy side-scrolling racer MotoHeroz puts you on hilly, dangerous tracks and a requirement for speed. Since it’s a racing title, the goal is to finish each track as fast as possible while smashing through wooden walls, performing flips and being careful not to fall into pits or stall out with accidental crashes. Touch controls guide your monster truck left and right, with two more buttons that allow you to flip either forward or back.

MotoHeroz distinguishes itself from other similar side-scrolling moto titles by throwing lots of items into the mix that you can collect and activate to surmount obstacles. Sticky tires let you climb hills, jetpacks allow you to fly over walls and even more items are available to affect your racing experience. The faster you finish, the more stars you’ll earn, which allow you to open up new tracks.

Kung Fu Rabbit (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Taking a page from great platformers on the iPhone and iPad such as League of Evil, Kung Fu Rabbit brings some solid touch controls to its game of jumping, avoiding deadly falls and grabbing carrots. You’ll also fight off enemies and do the other sorts of things you expect from a 2-D side-scrolling platformer, but Kung Fu Rabbit stands apart with good controls and an interesting art style to compliment the action.

You get 70 levels to bounce through in Kung Fu Rabbit, each filled with careful jumps, walls to bounce off of and enemies to slaughter. You can also unlock 15 items to customize your rabbit, and the game is compatible with Apple TV over AirPlay, so you can get it on a bigger screen, if you like. There’s also Game Center support for achievements and leaderboards.

Dreamy Goat (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Dreamy Goat is something of a weird 2-D side-scroller. It’s designed to be more relaxing than challenging, which is why it contains no enemies or obstacles. As Goat, your goal is just to grab items and jump on stuff – the more items you collect and stuff you jump on, the longer you hold the sun at bay. If the sun comes up, you’re zapped out of the dream world. Get far enough and you’ll migrate to different dream scapes.

With a very interesting art style and two different gameplay modes – the regular “sun” mode and the completely relaxed “zen” mode – Dreamy Goat is definitely an interesting, easygoing title. The music in the game also reacts to how you play, and you’re capable of making Goat jump as many times as you want with the game’s single tap control.

Paper’d (iPhone, iPad) Free

Customize your iOS device and access all kinds of images for your iPhone and iPad with Paper’d. The app is filled with hundreds of wallpapers you can download for free to give your device’s home screen the flare and personality you want. Paper’d also features a rotating gallery of images that can be downloaded through in-app purchases.

Wallpapers are organized to be easy to search and can be previewed ahead of downloading them to see how they look on both your lock screen and your home screen. You can also download individual wallpapers, or whole collections so you can rotate them in later.

Peel – Personal TV Show Guide update (iPhone, iPad) Free

Fans of American Idol will want to check out the latest update to social networking TV app Peel, which has just added a bunch of features specific to the show and its fans. Fans of the show can now access Peel as they watch live, “cheering” and “booing” along with the rest of the audience and other Peel participants, and rate the performances as they watch them, as well as rate the performances of the judges.

Peel isn’t just for American Idol, however: it’s designed to help you find TV shows to watch, by date, time, genre and more. Peel brings you a visual guide to what’s on TV, allows you to share what you’re watching with others and mark your favorite shows, while cutting shows you don’t like from your search results. And you can set alarms to help you avoid missing the shows you like.

Coco Loco (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Coco Loco is an arcade game in which you need to shoot your marshmallow friends at structures to destroy them and knock out oppressive coco beans. It’s basically the same setup as Angry Birds and similar titles, but with desserts. But Coco Loco isn’t just a clone of Angry Birds: it adds puzzle elements and liquid physics to really change up the common formula.

In each level, you’ll have to puzzle out how to get the results you need. In some levels, you’ll be able to knock over vats of chocolate to destroy structures; in others, you’ll expand jelly items and explode them to spray goo all over the level. You’ll have to think creatively through each level to manipulate Coco Loco’s elements and get the best scores available.

Pebble Universe (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Another physics puzzler with an interesting take on the genre, Pebble Universe isn’t about firing objects at enemies, it’s about bashing rocks together. In order to take out the stationary monsters in each puzzle level, you’ll need to tap the screen to let your pebble characters roll into position. The key is to roll two pebbles together at the right spot to send debris shooting into the air, and that means getting the timing right to get the two characters to smack into each other.

Pebble Universe packs a cute art style and some addictively simple play. The fewer pebbles you can use in each level, the higher your score will be. And you can see how you stack up against other players thanks to Game Center leaderboards and achievements.

Hudld (iPhone, iPad) Free

Social networking hub Hudld may well be the new app you use to connect to your friends’ updates. Hudld allows you to filter in all your updates from Facebook and Twitter into one place, allowing you to update both social networks from the same app at the same time. Hudld also allows you to see updates from your friends from both networks, as well as access things like photos and other features from both Facebook and Twitter.

Hudld allows you to lots of the things you can do on both Twitter and Facebook from one place, like upload photos and video, view requests, replies and notifications, and approve friends or follow or unfollow other users. The app also streamlines everything into one place so it’s easy to read, making it simple to keep up with everything that’s going on.

Mass Effect 3 Datapad (iPhone, iPad) Free

Electronic Arts’ second tie-in app for Mass Effect 3, its huge sci-fi epic that just hit Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC last week, Mass Effect 3 Datapad is a pretty interesting addition for people who enjoy the huge Mass Effect universe. The free Datapad app packs a meta-game of its own in the vein of social games seen on Facebook, but it’s also packed with information fans will get a kick out of.

The primary feature of Datapad is the huge Mass Effect codex that brings all kinds of information about the universe right to players. It’s the same encyclopedia that players can access in-game, supplying information about the galaxy of the game, much of which is fully narrated. Datapad also ties into the console or PC title to bring you messages from characters you meet that relate to the story you choose as you play, and lets you tap into the Mass Effect Twitter feed. Best of all is the game, which lets you deploy forces to take on missions and earn you rewards you can use in Mass Effect 3. Fans will want to check this app out.

Sir Benfro’s Brilliant Balloon (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Like lots of other titles in the App Store, Sir Benfro’s Brilliant Balloon is, in many ways, a running title. It’s a 2-D side-scroller in which you manipulate Sir Benfro and his titular balloon by touching the screen. Hold your finger on the screen and Sir Benfro rises; let go and he falls. You’ll need to navigate each level, avoiding obstacles and adjusting your speed through rapid taps and long touches in order to reach the end and pull down good scores.

Along the way, Sir Benfro needs to collect fireflies to power his balloon, and crashing or taking too long costs him fireflies and, eventually, all the lift the balloon carries. The game packs a great art style and some phenomenal musical selections, as well as four different levels to work through and three difficulty modes for each one.

Storm Strikers (iPhone, iPad) $1.99

Shoot-’em-up Storm Striker is a pretty archetypal vertical shooter. Players control a space ship by dragging a thumb over the screen, steering the ship clear of a whole lot of incoming fire while leveling enemy ships with lasers of your own. The key is to stay alive through quick reflexes as you take down waves of ships and destroy huge bosses along the way.

Storm Strikes includes seven different levels to work through, each requiring players to snag power-ups to upgrade their weapons and take down as many alien fighters as possible. Storm Strikers also packs four difficulty modes to make sure players constantly have a challenge to deal with, and Game Center support so they can track their progress on achievements and leaderboards.

Pollroll (iPhone, iPad) Free

Powered by Ask.com, Pollroll makes it easy for users to instantly generate opinion polls to send to their friends and family through integrated social networking. It requires a Facebook or Twitter account to get started in order to tap into a base of users to whom you can send your questions, but once you’ve got that, polls are created simply by typing out a question and some answer choices and adding a photo.

Along with the ability to create polls and share them, Pollroll is packed full of other polls created by others that let you see how many people think the way you do and read the comments of other users who have responded to them. Pollroll also can bring you results based on your location, showing you how many people in your area have voted on a given poll and what they tended to think about it.

Pulse News update (iPhone, iPad) Free

News aggregator Pulse gained popularity last year for providing a slick and simple interface for reading news stories. It makes it easy to tap into a number of online media outlets such as Wired or Fast Company, bringing their stories to a visual home page where you can tap interesting headlines and read the news, all without the pain of trying to browse your favorite sites on a mobile web browser.

The latest update to Pulse makes it more dynamic and more relevant to readers with the addition of “local” content. By plugging in GPS data from your iPhone or iPad, Pulse can find and bring you regional stories from your area through a partnership with Patch. The app also pipes in local deals, sports news and restaurant reviews.

Sminis (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Sminis are robots, and your goal in the game by the same name is to help those robots navigate potential destruction by avoiding obstacles and reaching safety. Fans of titles such as Lemmings will be pretty familiar with the simple but engaging gameplay, in which you tap a button to signal your robots to move and tap it again to stop them. You’ll need fast reflexes and good timing to get your sminis through each level and keep them from mashing into each other or getting crushed by various forces.

As the game gets harder across Sminis’ 30 levels, you’ll need to multitask and amp up your reflexes to keep your robots from buying it on their path to safety. There are also hidden items to collect along the way, and Game Center support for achievements and leaderboards.

Hang In…Go! (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Puzzle-platformer Hang In…Go! puts you in the role of a gooey creature that has to navigate through its various levels by firing slime tentacles at objects. Those tentacles let you stick ceilings and walls, allowing you to swing yourself forward, sling-shot off things and perform other moves to get moving forward. Hang In…Go! uses a combination of touch and tilt controls to make that happen, allowing you to shake your device to stretch your tentacles, tilt back and forth to swing, and so on.

There are 17 levels in all, which grow longer and more difficult as time goes on. Players will have to use their goo skills to avoid obstacles, traps, and falls to their deaths. There are also hidden areas to find and puzzles that change gravity to challenge you as you go, requiring you to rotate your device and think about new ways to progress.

NCAA March Madness Live (iPhone, iPad) Free

Get everything you need to prep for March Madness with NCAA March Madness Live. The app provides you with a tournament bracket to fill out and provides alerts so you always know when the next game is about to be played. You can keep track of how your bracket is doing as games are played and follow stats for all the players and teams as they play.

You can also make an in-app purchase to watch streaming games, practices and highlights from throughout the playoffs. You can also post updates straight to Facebook and Twitter from the app as you watch games and track your bracket.

LookTel Recognizer (iPhone, iPad) $9.99

Designed to help users with visual impairments, LookTel is an app designed to use iOS device’s cameras to identify common objects like cans of food and other products. The app can quickly and easily identify objects which have been saved into the app’s memory. By snapping a photo of an object and recording a name or description, LookTel can recognize it later, playing the name back to the person utilizing the app.

It’s important to note that LookTel requires a sighted person to set it up, snapping photos of objects and recording their descriptions to be used later. Once you’ve saved all the objects you need, you can backup your database by email, so that if you switch iPhones or lose your data, you can quickly reload your catalog of objects without having to re-record them.

Adventure Bar Story (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Role-playing game fans will be familiar with the taverns of games in that genre. It seems that whenever you go adventuring in a fantasy world, you head back to town and to a tavern to buy food and heal up. The bar is also where you sell off all the junk you’ve collected in dungeons. In Adventure Bar Story, you run just such an establishment for adventurers, but in order to keep it running, you have to go clean out some dungeons yourself.

Adventure Bar Story melds a management simulation game, in which you’ll need to make food to serve to customers, and an RPG in which you’ll fight off monsters to gather new ingredients for cooking. The game includes 400 recipes to find and make and the more you find, the higher you can rank up your bar.

Plants War (iPhone, iPad) Free

PC gamers who enjoy online games such as League of Legends will get a kick out of Plants War. It’s much like LoL, in that players command “hero” units and send them into battle. The goal is to destroy your enemy’s stronghold while protecting your own, being careful to keep your units alive and strong as they battle against the heroes of the enemy side.

You’ll unlock more characters as the game goes on, each with its own special abilities to take into battle. Plants War packs more than 30 stages to fight through and packs three different difficulty modes with which to challenge yourself. It also includes 24 achievements to unlock as you play.

iPhoto (iPhone, iPad) $4.99

The latest in Apple’s iOS apps is designed to maximize the full potential of the new iPad’s upgraded camera and Retina display, but since the device won’t be available until March 16, iOS fans will have to make do with using iPhoto on their existing iPads and iPhones. That’s okay though, because iPhoto packs a ton of image browsing and editing features that work on Apple’s late-generation devices, too, allowing users to make some very cool things out of their mobile photos.

Multi-touch editing capabilities mean iPhoto makes it easy to crop, burn, dodge, adjust and otherwise edit your images without the need for a desktop computer or a dark room. It’s easy to import photos from your computer that you didn’t shoot with your iOS devices and edit them in iPhoto as well, and images can be saved to the camera roll, sent straight to your photo stream or uploaded directly to Facebook, Twitter and other social networks from within the app.

Lightopus (iPhone, iPad) $2.99

Arcade title Lightopus is something of a visual dance. The colorful game is all about saving light-based life forms that are trapped underwater in round zones. As the lightopus, a glowy squid-type animal, it’s your job to crack open shells and free the little plankton-like animals and lead them to safety. The more you save, the more points you earn as you flee each stage. But you can also use your followers to take down enemies and since you have no real defenses of your own, you’ll need to sacrifice a few of them for your own survival.

As you swim around in Lightopus, utilizing the game’s touch controls, you’ll also need to hunt down stars, which multiply your score and allow you to access new areas. Searching for stars and power-ups is always a trade-off between long-term survival and high score, because if enemies hit you, you’ll lose health. Lightopus also includes Game Center support, which provides achievements and online leaderboards for players to climb.

Cavorite 2 (iPhone, iPad) $1.99

The follow-up to the smart side-scrolling puzzler Cavorite, Cavorite 2 offers a lot of the same kinds of challenges as its predecessor, with some new ideas thrown in. Each puzzle is about pushing around blocks to activate switches, climb obstacles and open doors. Trouble is, some of the switches are on the ceiling of the level, or located on high ledges. But you can access them (and a lot of other things) using an anti-gravity gun that lets blocks float, and you along with them.

Cavorite 2 packs 63 new puzzle levels, and challenges that didn’t appear in the first game, like navigating water by swimming. You’ll also have to deal with blocks that behave in new ways, like exploding to blow open walls, in order to solve puzzles. You’re scored by how fast you complete each puzzle, and you can track your progress using Game Center’s leaderboards and achievements.

Monster Flip (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Monster Flip is a tricky match-three title. Like similar games such as Bejeweled, the goal in the game is to match up groups of similar objects by switching them with adjacent ones to make vertical or horizontal groups of three or more. In Monster Flip, however, you don’t switch the monsters with their neighbors, you switch them in groups of three that rotate end-over-end. It’s a minor change that requires a whole new way of thinking about the puzzles.

There are other obstacles that pop up in Monster Flip as you work your way through each stage by knocking down a requisite number of matches. Some monsters come with a timer and have to be matched and eliminated in a certain number of flips, for example. Monster Flip includes four different game modes to challenge you, and a great art style to boot.

Square Register (iPad) Free

Mobile payment service Square has used the iPhone to allow lots of people who wouldn’t otherwise be able to easily sell their products on the go to instantly create retail locations. The app, along with its headphone jack credit card reader hardware, let’s just about anybody take credit cards as payment, instead of just cash. After huge success with the iPhone app, Square has rolled out an iPad counterpart that turns tablets into cash registers, instantly and easily.

Square Register lets you swipe credit cards to take payments for goods and services, and also has the capability to track cash transactions and keep records of your business’s inventory. Like Square’s iPhone app, it also has the ability to issue print or email receipts to users, and gives businesses that use it access to web analytics so they can track their sales without a lot of hassle.

Monty Python: The Holy Book of Days (iPad) $4.99

Monty Python fans shouldn’t be without this iPad offering. Titled “The Holy Book of Days,” the app is an interactive book created by the famed British comedy troop, detailing the creation of their film, Monty Python and the Holy Grail. It details each day of the movie’s 28-day shoot and is packed with information and content that was created or pitched for the movie but which never made it into the final product.

Released to correspond with the Blu-Ray version of Monty Python and the Holy Grail, The Holy Book of Days acts like a “second screen” if you happen to buy the film, allowing you to follow along with the movie as you watch it to get extra insights into each scene. Even if you don’t watch along with the film, though, there’s a ton of content created by Monty Python members for the app – it’s a look at this comedy classic from an angle no one has ever seen before.

Mass Effect Infiltrator (iPhone, iPad) $6.99

From the developer behind the 2011 iOS hit Dead Space comes Mass Effect Infiltrator, another mobile tie-in title for one of publisher Electronic Arts’ biggest video game franchises. Mass Effect Infiltrator gives players a rifle and sends them out to fight robotic enemies called the Geth, creating a cover-based shooter that uses a combination of touch controls and swipes.

Instead of just being about gunning down bad guys, Infiltrator is about gunning down bad guys well. Players can earn “style points” for being especially quick, creative and effective in dispatching enemies. Drop a bad guy and then take out his friend in rapid succession, for example, and get a bonus. Switch weapons in the middle and get even more. Each level is scored at the end based on how fast players completed it, how hurt they got and how stylishly they killed. The game also links to the newly released game Mass Effect 3 to give players bonuses in their console or PC titles.

Draw Something by OMGPOP (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Taking a page from other asynchronous, turn-based online games found in the iTunes App Store, Draw Something lets players take turns competing in a Pictionary-like competition. As in that game, players take turn drawing pictures based on a single-word prompt, and other players have to guess what the drawing is. Since the app is turn-based, games proceed as quickly or as slowly as players want.

Draw Something lets you play against your friends from social networks such as Facebook and Twitter, but it will also match you into games with strangers if you’re just looking to find someone to play with. It also includes leaderboards to track how well players do against the competition and provides Push notifications for you when it’s your turn.

Leap (iPhone, iPad) Free

Social photography app Leap is a little turns snapping shots with your iPhone into a bit of an impromptu scavenger hunt. The app lets you snap and share photos with friends, as well as challenge your friends to find and capture shots that let them compete. Each group of challenges has a different theme, and photos shot in each one can easily be shared with Facebook and Twitter.

You can try lots of different challenges and bring your friends into the game as well, allowing you to play along with friends from Facebook. Challenges range from finding cool things to do on a Friday night to eating healthier, as the app’s developers explain, so Leap can give you a lot to do while also giving your iPhone’s camera a workout and putting all those Facebook photos to good use.

Camera Awesome (iPhone, iPad) Free

The hot new camera app in the iTunes App Store is Camera Awesome, and with good reason. The “awesome” in Camera Awesome refers to its one-touch photo touch-up capabilities. Just hit the app’s touch-up button and it instantly adjusts color, saturation, brightness and other levels and effects on your photos to punch them up and make them look a lot better.

Camera Awesome includes more than just clean-up software, however. It also supports video and packs some photo editing capabilities and filters that allow you to turn your images into something new and different. And users can instantly share their shots across social networks, either automatically or with a single button push.

Word Poker (iPhone, iPad) Free

What’s better than an App Store word game or an iOS poker title? How about a puzzler that combines the best of both? That’s Word Poker, a game mixing the vocabulary prowess necessary for games such as Words With Friends and Scrabble, with the gambling draw of poker. The rules are similar to Boggle in a way – you’re given five cards, each featuring a letter, at the start of each round and take turns betting based on how strong you think or hand is. You can fold if you’re not confident or bet high to bluff, just like in poker.

Once the chips are in, players race the clock to come up as many words as possible from their group of five letters. More points are divvied out for words with more letters in them, and whoever finishes with the most points wins the pot. As you gather chips and best opponents, you can track your progress (and how you stack up against other players) on Word Poker’s Game Center leaderboards.

Big Win Soccer (iPhone, iPad) Free

Soccer simulation Big Win Soccer also includes cards, much like the Word Poker above. Part card game and part simulator, players gather cards in Big Win that allow them to build and customize teams. You’ll use players cards to populate the field, then give them an edge by playing skill cards and event cards to try to win soccer matches.

Big Win lets you take the game online to compete against other players and earn points as you go, which allow you to get new cards and improve your team. It also has a daily trophy you can compete for online, plus Game Center support for achievements and leaderboards.

Readability (iPhone, iPad) Free

Ever come across a great website article at work but don’t have the time to read it? Or, discover a page so full of clutter and ads it’s practically impossible to enjoy its content? Here’s where Readability can help. It allows you to save pages to your iOS device which you can read later, but more importantly, it clears them of clutter and presents them in a simple, clean format that’s easy on the eyes.

The typography is elegant and all articles are synced so they can be read on any of your iOS devices, even if you’re offline. You can customize the font size, adjust contrast to avoid eye strain and Readability also offers a straightforward way to share what you’re reading with your friends on Facebook and Twitter or via email.

Zombies, Run! (iPhone, iPad) $7.99

Need a little motivation to get up for that morning jog? Give Zombies, Run! a try. The app turns working-out into something of a narrative gaming experience, putting runners into a story of the zombie apocalypse. It provides some pretty good (fictional) reasons to put in a couple of miles: because the hungry undead are chasing you.

Zombies, Run! has a story co-written by award-winning novelist Naomi Alderman, which is piped into your headphones as you go for a run or walk. The game part of Zombies, Run! is played just by running, but it includes 30 missions that use your iPhone’s GPS tracking capabilities to play. Think of it as a fitness trainer and run-tracking app that also has a story to tell.

BlockHopper (iPhone, iPad) $1.99

BlockHopper is one of those side-scrolling platformers where your job is to do more than just leap from platform to platform. You also have to create the platforms before you jump to them, and that brings a degree of puzzle solving to BlockHopper’s gameplay. Each level has you finding the best way to traverse it and find your way to a specific location, avoiding spikes and clearing some big gaps both by skill and good planning.

There are 35 levels to playthrough in the retro-inspired BlockHopper, across six themes that each have their own style and music. The game also features an 8-bit art style to complete the nostalgic motif. There’s also Game Center support for achievements and leaderboards.

Gluddle (iPhone, iPad) $1.99

A bit of a weird puzzle title is Gluddle, which has you trying to bounce colored eyeballs around a stage in order to take out oppressive white “Supervision” eyes and free the cute colored eyes from their scrutiny. The goal is to use as few “gluddles” as possible in each stage, launching them in any direction from their starting location and knocking out the Supervision eyes by hitting them. The puzzle part of the game requires you to choose your shots carefully and to freeze gluddles in mid-air and use them as bouncing pads.

More and more challenges arise as you work your way through Gluddle’s 55 levels. Each stage tracks your stats to allow you to complete challenges as you go and see how your skills stack up in comparison to players all over the world.

dealBoard (iPhone, iPad) Free

Making it easy to find great deals in your area (and on things you want) is dealBoard, an app that aggregates coupons and deals from lots of different services and filters them to make sure you’re not wasting your time with things that don’t appeal to you. The app builds a personal profile based on information you provide to make sure it’s only pulling relevant deals, but because it pulls from thousands of sites, businesses and services, it may well find deals you’d otherwise miss.

dealBoard updates its offers every day to bring you the latest means of saving money. It lets you give a “thumbs up” or “thumbs down” to deals in order to build information about what appeals to you, and if you find you’d like to see other deals in the vein of what has been suggested for you, you can swipe to see similar entries.

Via.Me (iPhone, iPad) Free

Social networking junkies will want to give a look to Via.Me when they’re out snapping photos and shooting videos this weekend. The app makes it easy to post status updates, photos, videos, audio and text across lots of different networks all from one location and in one shot. But it’s not just a social networking portal. Via.Me also includes photo filters of its own to let you stylize your shots before you send them out into the digital world.

The app packs 18 photo filters that allow you to adjust your images before you post them, and Via.Me allows users to comment on your shots and for you to comment on theirs. It can also bring all the photos your friends post into one place as a photo feed, or allow you to watch what’s going down on your social networks with its news feed feature. The app can also give you push notifications so you can keep up with what people are saying about your shots no matter what you’re doing.

Fancy Pants (iPhone, iPad) $0.99

Fancy Pants is a fast-paced platformer in which you take on the role of a shorts-wearing stick figure as you blast through various levels. Your speed and acrobatic prowess allow you jump off walls, run up vertical surfaces and hurtle through space at a pretty fast clip, while you collect items and stars to pull down the best score in each of the game’s levels.

Featuring a hand-drawn art style that adds a lot to the atmosphere, Fancy Pants includes a ton of weapons and clothes you can find to customize your character and take with him into the game. You’ll need to collect lots of items in each stage to unlock the best items, however, so it pays to search each of Fancy Pants’ levels diligently.

Prince of Persia Classic (iPhone, iPad) $2.99

A graphical overhaul of the classic side-scroller, Prince of Persia classic brings a tough action-platformer to your iPhone. The game requires patience and skill as you race to escape from prison to save a beautiful princess from an evil vizier, as there are plenty of obstacles in your way like spikes, pits and guards.

The levels of Prince of Persia are maze-like, and in order to make your way through them, you’ll need to make full use of the Prince’s acrobatic skills. The game includes three modes: the classic single player game, a time attack mode and a survival mode, in which you have 60 minutes to finish the game without dying. There’s also Game Center support for achievements and leaderboards.

Waking Mars (iPhone, iPad) $4.99

Turns out, there’s life on Mars, and you’re part of the team sent in to study it. As an astronaut on a mission of discovery, you delve deep into Martian caves to study harmless, helpful and volatile Martian life in Waking Mars. As the story progresses, your goals become mostly about spreading life to solve puzzles and save yourself from the hostile Martian environment.

Waking Mars is a side-scrolling platformer at its heart, but with an interesting sci-fi storyline to push it forward. It also requires coordination and brainpower to find your way through the Martian depths and decode signals and make discoveries as you go. The game also packs Game Center support to provide achievements along the way.

AaaaaAAaaaAAAaaAAAAaAAAAA!!! (iPhone, iPad) $2.99

The intensity is on high in AaaaaAAaaAAAaaAAAAaAAAAA!!! (Force = Mass x Acceleration), a game that’s all about base jumping. The game puts you in a first-person perspective and has you diving off high buildings, scoring points along the way by using tilt controls to hit “scoring panes” along the way. You also earn points by being a reckless daredevil, flying close to buildings and even flipping off people protesting your crazy stunt ways.

In each level, players earn points that can be used to unlock new abilities and new stages as they go. All the unlockables are arranged in a grid, which means you’ll need to plan which items you unlock, since you can only unlock items adjacent to other spots on your grid. The game packs 47 levels in total (that you’ll need to revisit to grab the highest scores), plus a pretty great sense of humor and Game Center support.

Zombie Panic in Wonderland Plus (iPhone, iPad) Free

Formerly a title for the Nintendo Wii, Zombie Panic is a shooter in which you play a girl finding herself amidst a zombie apocalypse. It’s something of a shooting range game, with your character positioned in the foreground, firing away at zombies slowly marching toward you. You’ll move your thumb around the screen to adjust your aim (zombies die when you hit them in the head, don’t forget), as well as tilt and swipe to move your character around to avoid danger.

The more accurate and deadly you are with your gun, the more points you earn in Zombie Panic. Each level is hugely destructible, too, so it helps to keep an eye out for stuff you can take out with your gun (including buildings) for more points. Eventually, you’ll unlock seven characters to take through zombie-smashing levels, and track your progress with the help of Game Center’s leaderboards and achievements.

Invader Hunter (iPhone, iPad) $2.99

Third-person shooter Invader Hunter is basically a series of boss fights. Each level has you, a regular-sized soldier in a suit of spiffy futuristic armor, taking on massive enemies that carry huge weapons and frightening attacks. Your goal is to dodge clear of them, pick your moments, and blast away at them with rifle you carry. You won’t be able to score hits too often, though. Invader Hunter is all about floating like a butterfly to avoid taking damage, and stinging like a bee when the opportunity presents itself.

As you take down bosses, you’ll earn components and gold that can be used to craft new equipment for yourself. You’ll need a variety of weapons and armor components to power up and take on more and more powerful bosses in each of Invader Hunter’s levels. The game contains more than 100 weapons and other items and 40 levels to work through, as well as some cool-looking stylized 3-D graphics.

Phil Hornshaw is a freelance writer, editor and author living in Los Angeles, dividing his time between playing video games, playing video games on his cell phone, and writing about playing video games. He’s also the co-author of So You Created a Wormhole: The Time Traveler’s Guide to Time Travel, which attempts to mix time travel pop culture with some semblance of science, as well as tips on the appropriate means of riding dinosaurs. Check out his Google+ profile.